As many of you probably know, I don't exactly sing the praises of things like acquisitions, mergers, that kind of nonsense. I think that is a major economic problem in this country.

While the Northwest/Delta airline merger might look good on paper - I think it is an American tragedy waiting to happen.

In the short-term, I think it could be good for the struggling economy in Minneapolis (the Northwest hub). As long as we keep the Northwest hub, I think it'll be great having twice the airplanes flying into our airport. Well, that is, if they can land with all the snow we get up here. Economically, it might help.

Here is the problem. The new company, apparently keeping the Delta name and dumping Northwest; apparently it now becomes number three, right beside United and American. I smell a rat - a rat called antitrust.

It seems to me that antitrust in this country is as much a thrown around phrase as impeachment. Apparently, a President can be impeached; but the process takes so long, Congress would never really impeach a president. While antitrust laws are in place, have corporations actually been pinned with an antitrust lawsuit?

The way I see it, is that, the new Delta will become too big. Simply because you will have Northwest's fleet of airplanes and pool of pilots; and Delta's fleet of airplanes and pool of pilots, covering essentially one schedule. My main beef is the domestic schedule. Would smaller carriers, like SunCountry and US Airways, who cover domestic schedules exclusively, be able to survive?

I'm not so concerned about the international schedule. SunCountry, USAirways, Southwest, etc. don't cover international flights. They are domestic carriers. But, with double capacity, as seemingly it would be with the merger, I think it could actually be a good thing for international fliers.

Northwest just recently added a non-stop schedule to Paris.

However, who's to say that Delta could basically swallow up SunCountry's domestic schedule in a beat? They could, they have double the capacity to do so. The same goes for Midwest Airlines, Southwest, US Airways; carriers that are exclusively domestic. But, can they survive under a carrier that has twice the capacity as before?

I could be off the deep end on the whole SunCountry, USAirways thing - but the way I see it, they might have some real trouble trying to keep their heads above water, in a time, and an industry, where it isn't exactly the easiest thing to do.

Let me

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